A Data Disaster Plan--Does Your Church Have One?

Well, it finally happened. My external media hard drive (purchased in 2005) died this week. We knew that it's time was near when we would open the server closet and hear it moan and groan.

Luckily in December I purchased a 1 TB drive for $80 (amazing since I bought the original drive in 2005 for $100 a GB) and I mirrored the drive in December and then uplugged it and left it on a shelf in my office.

So, this week when the old drive died, I simply had to replace it with the new one and I was off again hopefully for another 5 years (not counting on it) Since it hadn't been backed up since December, I only lost Jan-Mar (not much that couldn't be replaced).

Does your church have a disaster recovery plan? We all talk about backing up and copies of data that we would need, but do you actually do it? It only takes a fire, tornado or some other disaster to make you wish that you would have done it.

Here's some steps:

1. Make a plan--execute the plan (actually do it). If you take a drive off campus (say to a safe place) then make that habit and do it.

2. Replicate several ways. Since this happened I have the media drive (or at least the most important parts) being replicated to several externals in other parts of the building. (External drives are CHEAP!)

3. Check into online backups (Carbonite) where you can upload your files for easy access.

4. Anticipate that your drives are going to die---it's going to happen (you just don't know when)

Do you have a data recovery plan?